1. Field of the Disclosure
The present invention relates to a system for controlling an air conditioner and method for controlling the same, and more particularly, to a system for controlling an air conditioner having at least one outdoor unit and at least one indoor unit connected to the outdoor unit, to which a data collecting gateway and a data collecting server are provided for a user to make real time monitoring of state information or operation information on the outdoor unit or the indoor unit as well as to make real time control of the air conditioning system; and a method for controlling the same.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
In general, an air conditioner is an appliance for cooling or heating a room or cleaning air in the room for making a room environment more comfortable to the user. In the air conditioners, there are separate type air conditioners and package type air conditioners. Though identical in view of functions, the separate type air conditioner has functions of the package type air conditioner separated into an indoor unit and an outdoor unit. Especially, since the separate type air conditioner allows plural connection of the air conditioners, the separate type air conditioner is versatile.
Recently, as use of the air conditioners increases sharply, multi-air conditioners are being installed, each of which has the indoor unit installed in every room of a house, or in every office in a building and an outdoor unit to which the indoor units are connected in common.
Basically, an air conditioning system including the multi-air conditioner is provided with the multi-air conditioner having at least one indoor unit and at least one outdoor unit to which the indoor units are connected in common, and a controller connected to each of the outdoor units installed in the building for monitoring states of the outdoor units and the indoor units and controlling operation of the outdoor units and the indoor units, integrally or individually.
Therefore, since the outdoor unit detects the state information, operation information or setting information on the outdoor unit and the indoor units and forwards the same to the controller, if the user inputs a room cooling order to one of the indoor units directly, the controller can notice the state and the setting information on the indoor unit connected to one of the outdoor units, thereby enabling to forward a control order to the outdoor unit for adjusting a condensing extent of refrigerant, accordingly.
The air conditioning system can be provided with a local controller for detecting the operation state of a plurality of multi-air conditioners and controlling the same through a gateway according to a result of detection.
The local controller can be a general PC (Personal Computer) or a dedicated controller, provided with the gateway which is a device for collecting and re-forwarding information between the general PC or the dedicated controller and the plurality of multi-air conditioners.
In a related art air conditioning system, the gateway collects the state information on the indoor units (names of the indoor units, setting temperatures, room temperatures, whether the indoor unit is running or not, and modes) from the air conditioners at a field once per every hour, and forwards the information to a data collection server located far from the gateway.
The information forwarding is made non-synchronically by all of the gateways at the field installed throughout an entire country according to individual operation times, and the data collection server analyzes a data received thus, stores in a data base, and allows the user to access to a web through the Internet from anywhere in the country to determine the state information on the indoor unit at the field.
In the meantime, with regard to the control of the air conditioning system, if the user gives the control orders through a remote control unit, the system receives the control orders in succession at the data base, and, upon reception of a monitoring signal on a facility thereafter, determines whether the data base has a control order relevant to the facility or not. And, if the data base has the control order, the system forwards the control order to the facility. Accordingly, control signals are received/transmitted in synchronization with monitoring periods.
A related art remote monitoring method of the system has the following problems.
First, no real time control is available at the related art system. That is, since the control signal is transmitted/received synchronized with the monitoring periods, it is required to wait one hour of monitoring period at the maximum for controlling the air conditioning system, thereby permitting no real time control data transmission.
Second, different control orders given in succession for controlling the system can not have time differences since control orders are not executed in real time. That is, the different orders transmitted in succession can be executed instantly regardless of control times given, causing the control order transmitted at last to be executed while the control order transmitted at first to be disregarded.